A popular holiday town on Tasmania’s east coast was under alert due to a bushfire burning in the area on Tuesday, with a severe weather warning active across much of the state for incoming “damaging winds”.
On Tuesday afternoon, authorities issued a warning for people living near Coles Bay Road, on the state’s east coast, to “leave immediately” due to an uncontrolled fire.
“The fire is travelling in an easterly direction towards Friendly Beaches from Coles Bay Road,” the alert, updated at 4.12pm, read.
An updated warning at 7.48pm urged people in the Coles Bay Road and Friendly Beaches area to “seek shelter now”.
The town of Coles Bay is at the entrance point for Freycinet National Park, with the area known for Wineglass Bay and other tourist attractions.
Tasmania Fire Service assistant regional chief Greg Butters said he expected strong winds — which the Bureau of Meteorology has projected could reach 120 kilometres per hour — would not subside until the “early hours of the morning, which is not ideal for fire fighting”.
He said the blaze began on the northern side of Coles Bay Road and had burnt along a three kilometre stretch.
“Roughly four kilometres in off the Tasman Highway is where that road has been affected, and it’s on both sides of Coles Bay Road,” he said.
“The wind is the main issue for us at the moment. Obviously, it’s not high temperatures, but the relative humidity was fairly low as well.”
“But this is typically a wind driven event. So obviously the north-west winds are pushing it in a south-easterly direction.”
Mr Butters said the Parks and Wildlife service had been working to evacuate campers from the area.
“People should be prepared to leave they should be leaving and relocating to either the Swansea Town Hall or moving to their nearby safer place if the access through Coles Bay Road is not clear,” he said on Tuesday afternoon.
“We’re asking people to push down into a nearby sort of safer place rather than trying to travel back towards Swansea at this point in time until we get some more information as to whether Coles Bay Road is accessible or not.”
No warning SMS received, local says
Coles Bay business owner Elly, who was holding back tears as she prepared to evacuate to the Coles Bay jetty, said things had been tense in the town.
“It’s pretty scary here right now, we’ve packed up our cars and our belongings and everything valuable I suppose. I’ve got my daughter and my dog in the car and we’re just watching the smoke roll easterly,” she said.
“The winds up here are incredibly strong today and with so much bush between Friendly Beaches and where we are it’s very scary.
“There’s not a lot you can do when you’re essentially on a peninsula with no way out, so it’s just a waiting game really.”
She said she hadn’t received any text messages from the fire service, and had instead been told about the blaze by her sister.
“Without that know-how, you’d just be in the dark,” she said.
Severe weather on the way, BOM says
Kristen Floyd from the Devils Corner Winery at nearby Apslawn said the business had been blanketed by thick smoke.
“It’s pretty scary, there’s lots of smoke and because it’s quite close to us that’s where the bulk of the smoke is coming from it’s quite thick,” she said.
“It’s quite windy here as well which is making it a lot scarier as well and obviously very dry because we haven’t had much rain.”
On Tuesday afternoon, the Bureau of Meteorology issued a severe weather warning for several regions of Tasmania, including Coles Bay, for damaging and locally destructive winds.
“A strong cold front will move eastwards across the Bight and across Tasmania tonight. This feature will produce a risk of damaging and locally destructive wind gusts over most parts of Tasmania until late Wednesday morning,” it said.
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